Internet Computer Bureau Limited is an Internet top-level domain custodian based in the United Kingdom. The custodian is responsible for maintaining the .io, .sh, and .ac country code top-level domains. [1] In 2017 it became a subsidiary of Afilias, a United States corporation. Afilias was later acquired by Identity Digital.
The company was established on 18 July 1996 as Internet Computer Bureau plc, [2] and became a private limited company on 16 December 2004. [3] [4]
Embroiled in controversy around its involvement in registration of .io domains associated with the Diego Garcia military base following the expulsion of the Chagossian population, [5] ICB was sold by Paul Kane to Afilias for $70 million in April 2017. [6]
A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet after the root domain. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in lower levels, it is the last part of the domain name, that is, the last non-empty label of a fully qualified domain name. For example, in the domain name www.example.com, the top-level domain is .com. Responsibility for management of most top-level domains is delegated to specific organizations by the ICANN, an Internet multi-stakeholder community, which operates the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), and is in charge of maintaining the DNS root zone.
Nominet UK is currently delegated by IANA to be the manager of the .uk domain name. Nominet directly manages registrations directly under .uk, and some of the second level domains .co.uk, .org.uk, .sch.uk, .me.uk, .net.uk, .ltd.uk and .plc.uk.
.info is a generic top-level domain (gTLD) in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. The name is derived from information, although registration requirements do not prescribe any particular purpose.
An internationalized domain name (IDN) is an Internet domain name that contains at least one label displayed in software applications, in whole or in part, in non-Latin script or alphabet or in the Latin alphabet-based characters with diacritics or ligatures. These writing systems are encoded by computers in multibyte Unicode. Internationalized domain names are stored in the Domain Name System (DNS) as ASCII strings using Punycode transcription.
.uk is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United Kingdom. It was first registered in July 1985, seven months after the original generic top-level domains such as .com and the first country code after .us.
The .ac top-level domain is the Internet country code (ccTLD) for Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, used primarily for Ascension Island. It is administered by NIC.AC, a subsidiary of the Afilias-owned company Internet Computer Bureau.
The domain name pro is a generic top-level domain in the Domain Name System of the Internet. Its name is derived from professional, indicating its intended use by certified professionals.
.vc is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
.in is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for India. It was made available in 1989, four years after original generic top-level domains such as .com, .net and the country code like .us. It is currently administered by the National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI).
The Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) .io is nominally assigned to the British Indian Ocean Territory. The domain is managed by Internet Computer Bureau Ltd, a domain name registry, with registrar services provided by Name.com.
.lc is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Saint Lucia, sponsored by the University of Puerto Rico and created on September 3, 1991. The registry is operated by Afilias and markets towards companies structured as LCs, LLCs or PLCs due to the possibility of a domain hack, such as CompanyName.L.LC and supposedly better names.
The domain name mobi is a generic top-level domain (gTLD) in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. The name is short for mobile.
Afilias, Inc. was a US corporation that was the registry operator of the .info, .mobi and .pro top-level domain, service provider for registry operators of .org, .ngo, .lgbt, .asia, .aero, and a provider of domain name registry services for countries around the world, including .MN (Mongolia), .AG, .AU (Australia), .BM (Bermuda), .BZ (Belize), .AC, .GI (Gibraltar), .IO .ME (Montenegro), .PR, .SC, .SH, and .VC. Afilias also provided ancillary support to other domains, including .SG (Singapore), .LA (Laos), and .HN (Honduras). It was merged into Identity Digital in 2022.
In the Domain Name System (DNS) hierarchy, a second-level domain is a domain that is directly below a top-level domain (TLD). For example, in example.com, example is the second-level domain of the .com TLD.
.web is a proposed top-level domain (TLD) that was created and assigned by an auction process to several bidding companies. It was awarded to Nu Dot Co LLC, which is primarily funded by Verisign.
.me is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Montenegro.
The British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) is an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom situated in the Indian Ocean, halfway between Tanzania and Indonesia. The territory comprises the seven atolls of the Chagos Archipelago with over 1,000 individual islands, many very small, amounting to a total land area of 60 square kilometres. The largest and most southerly island is Diego Garcia, 27 square kilometres, the site of a Joint Military Facility of the United Kingdom and the United States. Official administration is remote from London, though the local capital is often regarded as being on Diego Garcia.
Public Interest Registry is a not-for-profit based in Reston, Virginia, created by the Internet Society in 2002 to manage the .ORG top-level domain. It took over operation of .ORG in January 2003 and launched the .NGO and .ONG top-level domains in March 2015.
Identity Digital Inc. is a company with affiliated entities that operate in the domain name industry, including a domain name registrar and registry services provider. It is owned by the private equity firm Ethos Capital. The company acquired the registry operator and back-end registry services divisions of Afilias, Inc. in 2020. Both Donuts Inc. and Afilias Inc. were rebranded and brought under the single company brand name Identity Digital in 2022.